


Acceptance: An Argument

by werpiper



Series: Her-my-own [2]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Arguing, Biracial Character, Gen, Hatstalls (Harry Potter), The Sorting Hat, Trans Character, Transphobia, You had one job, deadnaming, self-knowledge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-07
Updated: 2020-02-16
Packaged: 2021-02-28 00:34:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,207
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22594870
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/werpiper/pseuds/werpiper
Summary: Finally, Hermione is in the wizarding world!  But her place is less secure than she imagined.
Series: Her-my-own [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1625812
Comments: 12
Kudos: 27





	1. the train

**Author's Note:**

> This was possibly going to be chapter 4 of my linked young-Hermione fic, Acceptance. But there is transphobia here (thanks, JKR, you had to inspire me :/ ) and I decided to keep it separate from my (hopefully totally cute and fun) account of Hermione's early experiences with magic as a Muggle-born.
> 
> This ends well, in keeping with canon, so have no fear.

Hermione waved to her parents, then turned resolutely towards the brick wall. Neville had walked up to it, nervous as anything, though she couldn't imagine why -- and promptly disappeared. She expected to do the same, and she did. When she turned around and her parents were gone, though, she felt very strange, sad, and lost. Magic was truly her calling, and Hogwarts was a wonderful school -- but there was only brick behind her, where Mum and Dad had been moments ago. Why did she have to leave her family for a different world to study?

"Come along, child," said Mrs. Longbottom, quite firmly. Hermione gritted her teeth and hurried after the older woman. She would have liked to walk back through, just for a moment, a last hug and kiss and promise to write, but Mrs. Longbottom was already weaving through the crowd. Neville was caught in her elbow like another piece of baggage. The train was huffing loudly on the track, so Hermione set her chin and stepped aboard.

She hadn't attended an actual school since the Vector Addition incident, long ago in her very first term, but she was determined to do well at Hogwarts. It was a _magical_ school, and the other children (and the faculty! and the staff!) would be witches, just as Hermione was herself. She had done her best to study in advance -- the first-year texts were not difficult; she had committed them to memory and practiced a little -- but meeting Neville and his grandmother had still been unnerving. So many things they took for granted weren't anywhere in the books -- from owl post and having a toad to the bizarre assortment of food on the snacks cart. The magical world was like a foreign country. She told herself severely to be brave; her father had immigrated to England, and he assured her he was very much at home there. But he wasn't here to ruffle her hair and jolly her now, and the countryside outside the window had gone rural and unfamiliar. She had squeezed herself into the corner to look at the window, and was trying not to cry again when she noticed that Neville actually was crying, and she turned to face him. "What's wrong?"

"It's Trevor," said Neville, hopelessly, "I've lost him again. Already. Uncle Algie is going to be..."

That seemed like an easy enough problem to solve. "You had him when you got on the train, didn't you?" Neville nodded. "Well, then he's probably still aboard. I know two charms for lost things," Hermione mused aloud, "and I've got powdered toad's-foot in my pack --" Neville's chin trembled, and Hermione stopped. She could tell she was making things worse, although she had no idea why. They stared at each other for a moment.

"Could we just, umm, look?" asked Neville.

"Of course," said Hermione, though truly wouldn't the charm would be simpler? But Neville seemed so relieved just because she had agreed that she simply stood up, leaving her pack beneath her seat. "Let's go."


	2. the toad

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Arguably nothing of interest happens here, I'm just spending a little time with the characters. If you're looking for the argument per se, skip ahead.

The rest of the train ride was more interesting, with something meaningful to do. At first they split up, with Hermione asking people in the forward cars and Neville moving towards the back. But within a few minutes he caught up with her, tears still in his eyes. "Nobody," said Neville, "has seen a toad. Not in years and years, according to some older students. Apparently they're extremely out of fashion." He sounded very bitter.

"Well," said Hermione, a bit taken aback. "I thought Trevor seemed very nice, and of course he's amphibian, and being able to go about in water and air as well must be useful -- that's practical for you, never mind fashion!" Neville stared at her, then laughed. 

"Owls are the thing now," he explained, "because of flying; they can get places fast."

"But owls can't swim," she said gently. She wasn't entirely sure none of them could, but did not want to worry Neville further; she filed it away mentally to look up later. "And so you two will have something they don't." 

"But if I can't find him, if he's _really_ gotten lost this time..." He was near tears again, so she patted the boy on the shoulder.

"Let's look together," she said, "and ask everyone. Wizarding animals are clever, aren't they? So he won't have jumped off a moving train or anything disastrous like that." She realized she didn't trust him to have searched very well, and so sighed and headed back towards the rear of the train, Neville trailing behind her. She almost wished he hadn't, so maybe she'd have had a few minutes with the supplies in her pack to try a finding charm after all. But he looked like he needed the company as much as anything, so they went together all the way to the caboose (which was empty of both people and amphibians). On the way forward, she took over the asking, in case Neville had somehow not been clear.

Just a few cars along they came across two boys and a rat, and one of the boys had a wand raised high in his hand. Hermione's heart leapt -- she had never yet seen anyone properly casting a spell with a wand before, and it was terribly exciting. She did ask about Trevor first (apparently Neville actually had as well; the boy with the wand was dismissive about it), but then she watched the boy with the wand closely, as he waved it about and recited:

"Sunshine, daisies, butter mellow, turn this stupid, fat rat yellow!"

The rat, which was gray and asleep, remained as it was. The rhyming and waving was like nothing she'd read about, let alone any magic that had ever worked for her, and she was both surprised and rather saddened at the failed attempt. Words came tumbling out -- was that even a real spell? -- until she remembered her manners and introduced herself.

The unsuccessful spellcaster introduced himself back -- Ron Weasley. The other boy was Harry Potter. Hermione gaped again; she had _read_ about Harry Potter, but here he was doing nothing magical, nothing at all to help his friend. But she could hardly scold him, since he was _Harry Potter_ , so she babbled on at random about houses and whatnot, then left as quickly as she could. She and Neville had a toad to find. And young wizards or not, even Harry Potter or not, Hermione was starting to feel like her new schoolmates were going to be no use at all.


	3. the test

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hermione picks a fight with the Sorting Hat.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THERE IS TRANSPHOBIA HEREIN.
> 
> I have used some features of the Wizarding world here as stand-ins for JKRowling, who is unfortunately notorious for her transphobia.
> 
> By and large I believe her fandom's response has been "WTF YOU TAUGHT US BETTER THAN THAT," for which kudos to the fans.
> 
> Anyway, this is therefore perhaps more appalling to read than the rest of my Hermione fics have been. So please be warned in case this is not something you feel like reading?
> 
> NB in keeping with canon, everything turns out just fine.

Hermione watched the Sorting Ceremony with tremendous interest. First the Hat sang a song, which was remarkable enough, and its bragging about its insight and skills was fascinating. She had no idea how even with magic a thing could read inside minds (definitely part of the "tricks" sections of her reading up on magic at the library), let alone be so assured all its choices would be correct. But she watched it go onto one head after another and call out a House name quick enough, and the first-year students each go to their assigned table and be welcomed. So she was impressed, and when Professor McGonagall called her name, she marched up to the stool and put on the Hat.

It was awkward, actually. The Hat had slipped down over the eyes of every other student, but it perched awkwardly on top of her own wild curls. She winced, wondering if she was supposed to have straightened her hair or perhaps cut it off? The letter hadn't said anything about how students had to wear their hair! -- but nearly all the other students where White, and their hair wasn't anything like hers. She gripped the brim with both hands and yanked, and finally was able to jam it on.

"Granger," said the Hat. It was both on top of her head and inside it somehow, the voice in sounding in her mind at least as much as in her ears. So it wasn't a trick about the mind, although she couldn't seem to read anything back about _it_.

"Hat," she replied, like reading silently, inside. Surname terms were apparently its manner?

"You like the idea of Gryffindor," it mused. "Heroic stories appeal to you, don't they? But you're a reader, and, my goodness, at your age an experimenter?" She felt her cheeks heat a little bit, but she could not deny either of those observations. "Ravenclaw is best for the studious...." Hermione kept her peace, and tried to open up her mind somehow. She wanted the Hat to know everything about her, and make the proper choice.

A little time passed in silence. Hermione began to think it was a little odd, it had seemed so quick to be certain about everybody ahead of her in the alphabet. "Please, Hat," she thought to it, "is there anything I can do to help?"

The voice in her head returned, now dripping with spite, sounding not much like the cheerful singing Hat at all. "Slytherin, perhaps. You're a sneaky little thing, aren't you? Just a child, and already determined to sneak into ladies' things." Hermione was baffled, then embarrassed, then appalled. "I think you should leave. You don't belong at Hogwarts at all. _Herman._ "

That _hurt_. Hermione bit her cheek and tried not to cry. A cousin had said something like that once, when they were being bathed together as little children, and she summoned all her courage along with the memory of what her mother had said at that time.

"No. You don't get to decide that. I'm me and I am the only one who can say what and who I am, and I am an honest person." She thought this very precisely and very carefully, and then anger overtook her and she rushed on: "You're just the Sorting Hat. You do Houses, that's your job. I think you're very bad at it anyway if you can't place me. But it's a terrible, stupid job, isn't it? People would be better off if they got to choose their own, and choose again if they wanted as well." She swallowed hard. "And I'm not named Herman and I am _not_ a boy. I never was." Mentally, she was also thumbing through _Hogwarts: A History_ , and the memories marshaled her thoughts. "So I got my letter, and you don't get to say about whether I go to Hogwarts or not. And if I _was_ a boy, that's on the stairs to decide, isn't it? To let me into the dorms, boys or girls. You don't get to say that either. You only get to say one thing, Hat. Just one single thing. And that's a House. I don't even care which one at all. Pick a House for me and be done, and I hope I never see you again!"

The Hat laughed. It was not a nice laugh, but at least it was not so loud this time. "You're not wrong, warlock child. All right, you've found my weakness, and I surrender to the limits of my own office. But let me ask once more, before I condemn you to a life where you cannot possibly belong in the decent Wizarding world: will you leave, quietly? You can go back to your parents. If they'll have you." It sounded dubious, but somehow it had said exactly what Hermione needed to hear.

"My parents would love to have me home," she replied, "they cried when they were hugging me good-bye, and I'll see them at Christmas and we'll have hugs and pancakes and presents. They're excited to have me here, and they look forward to hearing what I learn. They sent me here to get the best education, for me, even though I'm a witch and probably never going to be a dentist and work in their practice. My parents know I'm magic, even though they didn't really even believe in magic before I was doing it. My Hogwarts letter confirmed everything, including that I belong in this school. And I'm their daughter, my parents know I'm a girl. They guessed wrong when I was a baby but they know it now and they love me." She breathed in deep, thinking about them. "They sent me here to get an education they couldn't give me at home. They'd tell you as much if they were here. So do it already, Hat. You went on and on about how clever you are about it. Just do your job and pick a House for me."

There was a long, echoing, hostile silence in her mind. Hermione sat stoic. She had said her piece, and whatever came of it, she knew fully well she was right.

"GRYFFINDOR!" shrieked the Hat. If it was still trying to talk inside her her head, she wasn't listening. Hermione ripped it off her head, then shook her head hard, and ran her hand through her curls to make them stand up. With as much dignity as she could, she put it back on the stool. She was shaking. But the table of children wearing red and gold were cheering and waving, and she walked over and took her place among them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Warlock" implies dishonesty and is tremendously insulting. Fuck that noise, Hat, you're a jerk.
> 
> Hermione's sorting in the first Harry Potter book is unremarkable, although Harry observes Hermione to "jam" the Hat on, in what I believe is a reference to her "bushy hair". I personally read this as an Afro, and Hermione as a biracial English girl. (Her dad is a black American by origin, in my mind; her parents met at an international conference for dentistry students.)
> 
> Hermione's Sorting taking a long time comes from some other, outside-the-book JKR writings.


End file.
